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THE 



Rabun Industrial School 



AND 



Mountain School Lxtension Work 



AMONG THL MOUNTAIN WHITES 



(BY ONL OF THEM) 



ANDRLW J. RITCHIE, A. M 
Founder and Superintendent 



RABUN GAP, GEORGIA 



Map of the Mountain Region. 




"In all the broad reach of this land of the free there is no 
field so teeming with the possibilities of a clear-sighted, 
virile, well-balanced, glorious Americanism as that to be 
found in the romantic Appalachian country. 

"And yet the husbandman of the mind does not bind up 
his sheaves there, nor the gleaner fill his bosom. Oh, what 
a harvest to be gathered and ripened." — Judge Emory 
Speer, on The Men of the Mountains . 



THE 



Rabun Industrial School 



AND 



Mountain School Lxtension Work 



AMONG THL MOUNTAIN WHITL5 



BY ONL OF THLM i 



ANDREW J. RITCHIE, A. M 
Founder and Superintendent 



RABUN GAP, GEORGIA 



V 



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Logan E. Jiu'.CKLi'^'. 

Georgia's Venerable Ex-Chief Justice and Grand 

Old Man of the Mountains. 



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rn TflK PROSPKROl^S AND THE GENEROUS: 

Ralnin is m\ native count)-, and ] have kept in touch with 
its peo])le all niv life. I know their needs and their re- 
sources. With a few rare exceptions. the\- are an excellent 
poiMilation — nc^ne hetter an\ where within the range of niv 
ac(jnaintance. ihit they are poor. There is no scliool of 
advanced grade within the limits of the county, and never 
has heen. Children in that region ahonnd ; the valleys and 
hillsides litcralh' swarm with them, and many of them 
have as ])right minds as can he found on earth. 

An etiort is now heing made to construct and maintain 
a school at which these children, or a due proportion of them, 
can obtain a i)ractical education. The leader in this good 
cause is Professor Andrew |. Ritchie, himself a native of the 
conntw and one of the few natives who ha\e managed to 
ac(]uire a collegiate education. He is de\-i:iing his time and 
energies to this nolile work as a labor of l(i\-e, and without 
the ho])e of other reward than the good which others may 
derive from it in the years to come. I have known him from 
his childhood, and ha\e known his parents and his grand- 
parents from mv own earl\- manhood. I vouch for his 
lidelitw and pledge mxself for the homst ap'plication of all 
funds which mav l)e entrusted to him for the ])urpose above 
referred to. Moreover, I a'p])eal to all the able and willing 
to aid him with such contrilnitions as they can afford. 

\'ery res])jct fully. 

.\tlanta. Ga., Januarv J, I'.'Ol. 



A PERSONAL WORD CONCERNING THE WORK. 

The object of this prospectus is to ask assistance for a 
work to which the writer has felt himself moved in behalf 
of a people which he believes are today the most important 
element in the South or on the American Continent to be 
reached by education — namely, the isolated and inilettered 
white people of the Southern Appalachian mountains. 

This work is one to which T have been impelled from a 
sense of patriotic duty and responsibility, and at the sacrifice 
of personal interests which it has been necessary to make to 
undertake such a work in this needy field. The county in 
which the work has been projected is the county in which I 
was born and reared. These mountain people are my own 
people. I know their great potential worth, and the priva- 
tions and destitutions by which they are surrounded. The 
disadvantages under v.-hich they labor are so great that no 
material improvement of their educational status is possible 
in this generation unless the}- shall have assistance from the 
outside, and unless some one shall undertake to secure this 
assistance for them by enlisting the interest- of the outside 
world in their condition. 




A Cabin on the; School Farm. 
Showing tlie Industrial School in the Background. 




A Mountain Family. 



AIM OF THE WORK. 

These isolated niDuntain people are not only lacking in 
education but are lacking in social and economic efficiency. 
They are without community spirit and incentive to com- 
munity action. Thev have no large social life, and are to a 
sad degree without wholesome moral and social standards. 
"Their religious life is in a dormant and decadent condition. 
Their industrial and economic life is notably inefficient and 
improvident. 

They need not only education which will develop their 
latent intellect and talent, but also education which will 
develop their industrial and social activities. They need to 
learn how to live and how to work, not only to own their 
homes as most of them do, but to make them more com- 
fortable and wholesome, and to cultivate their mountain 
farms in a scientific and intensive way. They need to learn 
the value of time, to acquire skill and efficiency, to cultivate 
-thrift and frugalitv, and to make the most of their resources. 



6 

A WORK OF EDUCATIONAL HUSSIONS. 

The work is one of educational missions. It seeks to 
supply educational means and educational endeavor in a vast 
isolated field in which these are lacking. It is a mission 
work which undertakes to help people help themselves. The 
mountain people are to be used as far as possible in working 
out their welfare. The work has not been thrust upon them, 
but has been projected as their own. Outside aid is solicited 
on condition that they do what they can themselves. This 
thev are being brought to do to a remarkable degree. 

To secure the largest local co-operation and also to unite 
all available outside aid in a common cause, the work has been 
projected upon a non-sectarian basis. It seeks the aid and 
co-operation of all Christian and philanthropic organizations. 
It has been brought to its present stage by what the moun- 
tain people have been able to do, together with the sacrifices 
which I in common with them have been willing to make, 
and with the help of a few outside friends who have come 
to its aid at needy times. Now that the mountain people have 
done the most that they are able to do in getting the work 
started, its further development depends upon the enlarge- 
ment of help from outside. 



A SOUTHERN WHITE PROBLE^I. 

The educational problem of the South is a white problem 
as well as a negro problem. It is the problem of the illiterate 
whites of the mountains as well as the illiterate negroes of 
tlie lowlands. It is a white problem as to what shall be done 
through the education of the white man for the proper solu- 
tion of the problem of the negro, as well as to what shall 
be done through the education of the white man for himself. 

The solution of the educational and economic problem of 
the negro is being found in education which provides 
industrial training, and much is being done, by both North 
and South, for the uplift of the negro in this direction. I plead 
for a like provision for the vast armies of unschooled and un- 



7 

trained whites in the isolated mountain districts about whose 
condition Httle is known and for whom little provision is 
being" made. 

Of the 210 counties in the South in which upwards of 20 
per cent of the white voters are unable to read and write, 
the greater number are found grouped together in the heart 
of this mountain region in which the population is almost 
entirelv white. In the area centering about the converging 
corners of the state sof w^hich it forms a part a map of 140 
contiguous counties can be traced in which more than 00 per 
cent of the voters are white, and in which more than 2<) per 
cent of these white voters are unable to read and write. 



A PROBLEM OF NATIONAL CONCERN. 

The Southern mountain region, lying in the heart of the 
South and comprising in one body the entire mountainous 
areas of the South east of the Mississippi, is the home 
of three and a half millions of white people. In its isolated 
position it has for a hundred years formed the neglected 
backyards of the states of which it forms a part. In the 
meantime it has furnished a sturdy American yeomanry 
which has rendered conspicuous service throughout our 
national history. vSam Houston, Andrew Jackson, Andrev/ 
Johnson, and Abraham Lincoln are types of the men it has 
produced. 

This great region forms today a middle territory between 
the two sections recently divided by the Civil War. It like- 
wise forms an intermediate territory of national integration 
between these two sections. These mountain people are 
Americans — z-\mericans in descent and sentiment. They 
have always stood for the integrity of the nation. Their 
patriotism has always been national rather than sectional. 
They were foremost among the nation's founders, and have 
been foremost among its defenders. They form today the 
largest and most distinct body of original American stock on 
the Continent. It is from the great reserve of this virile 
stock which they constitute that the purest American blood is 




JOSEPH E. BROWN. 

Spending his childhood and boyhood in the mountain section to 
be benefitted by the proposed industrial school, four times Governor 
of Georgia, Chief Justice, United States Senator, his career illustrates 
the possibilities of the mountain boy. 



to be transmitted to future generations. vShall it not be likewise 
that in their inherent patriotism and in their development by 
education are to be found the best reinforcements for the solu- 
tion of the problems which concern alike the South and the 
Nation, and for the preservation of the highest American 
ideals '■! 




A Patriarch a.xd His Second Family. 



A TYPICAL AIOUNTAIN COUNTY. 

Rabun County, the count}' in which this educational work 
is projected, lies in the heart of this illiterate mountain 
region. It occupies a strategic position in this great field. 
It is within striking distance of four states, and in the midst 
of a section in which the mountain ends of three of these 
states converge. In the region to which it is fairly central 
a map of no less than fiftv contiguous counties can be traced 
in which 95 per cent of the voters are white, and in which 
'-.'5 per cent of the voters are illiterate. Situated in the heart 
of the Blue Ridge mountains, in the extreme northeastern 
corner of Georgia, hedged about by mountain barriers on its 
southern and western borders and on the borders of the 



10 

Carolinas, it has been, until the recent advent of a raih-oad, 
one of the most isolated and inaccessible counties in all the 
Southern mountain region. In its isolated position all the 
conditions have prevailed peculiar to the remote mountain 
community. It presents the mountain problem in all its 
■jjhases — educational, social, m.oral, religious and economic. 



THE MOUNTAIN PEOPLE. 

The people found in this mountain county are of the 
v^arly Anglo-Saxon stock which has been preserved in the 
isolated m.ountain districts of the South as the purest and 
most distinct remnant of original American blood on the 
Continent. They are the descendants through several gener- 
ations of early settlers who moved southward and westward 
into the mountains from Southern Pennsylvania, Mrginia, 
and the Carolinas. They are principally of English and 
Scotch-Irish descent, with a sprinkling of Dutch and Hugue- 
not. Among them are the descendants of men who fought 
at Cowpens and King's jMountain, and at the Horseshoe and 
New Orleans. They are a people of heroic and unsubdued 
spirit, prolific, patriotic, and in point of physique and native 
mentality the equals of any population on the globe. 



THEIR BACKWARD CONDITION. 

The backward conditions prevailing among these people 
are not to be accounted for by any theory of original in- 
feriority as a race or class, but are conditions which have 
been produced by the long operation of influences under 
which it would be more than human for a people not to 
retrograde or degenerate. Their greatest misfortune has 
l)een their long enforced isolation from the outside world. 
Shut ofif in the mountains, without railroads and other means 
of outside communication, they have fallen behind in the 
march of progress and have been overtaken by evils peculiar 
to their environment which have intensified their unhappv 
condition. 



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MOUNTAIN WHISKEY. 

One of the greatest of these evils is mountain whiskey. 
There are few of the mountain people today who do not 
know that its illicit manufacture is both legally and morally 
wrong. Its evil effects are patent to every observer of moun- 
tain conditions. There is no greater source of moral or 
social deterioration. Its trail of sloth and shiftlessness can 
be traced to every mountain cabin where the wolf of hunger 
howls at the door. Its trail of blood can be traced on every 
page of mountain criminal history. The resources which it 
causes to be wasted in idleness, dissipation, and litigation 
in the courts would build a school and church in every com- 
munity. 

Rabun County has most unhappily suffered from this 
great evil. Its secluded position and its inaccessibility to 
outside markets have made it inevitably the home of the 
"moonshiner" and a banner comity for the manufacture of 
this "moonshine" product. The county is today fairly 
swamped with whiskey and whiskey sentiment. 



THE MOUNTAIN FEUD. 

Another evil peculiar to the mountain environment is 
the mountain feud and the divisions which exist among the 
people and prevent their co-operation for their common good. 
In the midst of the ignorance and prejudice which prevail 
m the narrow mountain horizons, feuds and divisions arise 
which last from generation to generation. The feud almost 
invaribly divides the people in politics, and the adherents 
of the opposing factions are found arrayed against each other 
in any matter in which there can be a conceivable factional 
or political advantage. The spirit of division affects the 
building of schools, churches, public highways and every 
interest which the people should have in common. 

Rabun County has almost from the beginning of its 
history been the seat of unhappy divisions which have kept 
it in a weak and disorganized condition. It has become 
widely known for the nun:ber and frequency of its homicides, 
and for the strife and lawlessness which have existed within 
its borders. 



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MORAL CUXDITIOXS. 

The n:oral condition of the mountain people and their 
attitude toward law and order have been formed largely by 
tlieir surroundings. It could scarcely be otherwise than that 
in the midst of their isolation there should be a deterioration 
of moral standards. It has been impossible to maintain the 
school and the chiu'ch m a measure conimensiu-ate with 
intellectual and spiritual demands. The churches which have 
stirvived are in a moribund condition. In many places the 
Gospel is seldom heard. The native preacher is without 
education, and often without the moral requisites of accept- 
able leadership. There has been a decline from the standards 
of citizenship of the first settlers. In many instances the 
descendants of original leading families have degenerated 
to the lov.'est levels. It is impossible in the remote 
mountain comn:unitv where these conditions prevail to re- 
habilitate society with the present adult population. The 
onlv hope is to be fotuid in the children. It is with them 
that the work of regeneration nuist begin. 



ECONOMIC CONDITIONS. 

The conditions imder which the mou.ntain people have 
lived have not promoted habits of thrift and industry. They 
have inherited to a large extent the leisure and makeshifts 
of the early backwoodsman who found it easy to subsist on 
the wild game and the corn-patch cultivated by his wife and 
children, and have been schooled to the poverty and pri- 
vations of this manner of living. As a result they are not 
fore-handed. Many of them live from hand to mouth. 
Their most abundant commodity is their unused and unvalued 
time. They are rich because they are poor. They are in- 
dependent because their wants are few and sin:ple. 

Though rich in undeveloped resources, Rabun is one of 
the poorest counties in all the mountain region. The people 
are uniformly of small means. There is no wealthy family 
or individual among them. They have no money crop, 
and handle little money from year to year. Their possessions 



16 

are limited to their small boundaries of mountain and valley 
land and the few head of live-stock which they raise on their 
mountain pastures. 

While a portion of the more well-to-do have fairly com- 
fortable houses, the great majority live in small cabins of 
one or two rooms, with scant furniture, without comforts 
and conveniences, and without many of the common articles 
of civilized life. Large families are the rule, and it is quite 
as comnion as otherwise to find a family of six to ten 
persons living in a cabin of one room, and often under 
conditions that are primitive to the last degree. 




Tending the Corn-Patch. 

(Not an uncommon scene in tlie mountains.) 



WEAKNESS OF THE MOUNTAIN CO^^IMUNITY 
IN COMMUNITY ACTION. 

Not only are the people poor and thinly settled, but their 
weakness in community action is out of proportion to their 
poverty and fewness in numbers. There are almost insuper- 
able obstacles to be overcome in organizing them in any 
movement requiring concerted action. They form a society 
in which they live as separate units. Their environment 
tends toward extreme independence and individuality. They 
are not given to the impulse and enthusiasm of co-operation. 
Their attitude toward their public interests is one of aloof- 



17 

ness and indifference. They have not learned the lesson 
of the bundle of sticks — that in union there is strength. 
The greatest obstacles of all are the feuds and schisms which 
deprive anv concerted movement of the solidarity of its full 
strength. For these reasons outside aid in educational and 
religious work is cjuite as necessary to get the people to do 
what they can themselves as for the good it will do of itself. 



PRESENT EDUCATIONAL STATUS. 

Rabun is one of the most illiterate counties in all the 
mountain region. According to the census of 1900, upwards 
of 20 per cent of the white voters were unable to read and 
write, and more than 98 per cent of the voters were wdiite. 

Until the opening of the Industrial School in 1905 there 
was no school of advanced grade in the county. The only 
schools have been the little public schools which run from 
60 to 90 days in the year, and these have made little intel- 
ligent headway. They are taught in most wretched houses 
and by teachers with little more training than these 
schools afford. The average child attends school about 40 
clays in the year, and the schooling which he gets is of the 
poorest and most rudimentary sort. 



A NEW EDUCATION NEEDED. 

The old education fails to reach the mountain problem 
because it is not adapted to mountain conditions. The goal 
\\'hich it sets before the mountain boy or girl is too often an 
escape from the work and environment of the mountain 
community and a change to the life of the town or city. Its 
practical operation is to educate the brightest material out of 
the community and to leave its social and economic life 
weakened and impoverished. The kind of education needed 
is education which shall have a larger bearing upon the life 
which the people are to lead. The school through which 
this education is to be provided must establish a practical 
connection between education and work. Its course of study 
must have to do with the industries of the environment. 
The mountain bov needs to be trained in agriculture, forestrv. 



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dairving ami anin^al husbandry, and in handicrafts in wood- 
work and ot]ier indv.etries for wh.ich tlie materials lie at hand 
unused. The niountain girl needs co be trained in the arts of 
orderly housekeeping and successful home-making which 
shall conibine with the pure mountain air and water to give 
these people the physic?d health wliich is their birthright. 

The moimtain school must also be an evangelizing 
spiritual and n:oral force. It n:ust do the work which is not 
being dene in the remote m.ountain district by the church and 
the evangelistic preacher. It niust set in motion influences 
which will soften the mountain temper and displace the spirit 
of feud. It must banish the evil of whiskey and its attendant 
evils of moral and social degradation. It must impart such 
a breadth and riclmess of social life as shall make the moun- 
tain comm.unity an attractive place in which to live. 



NATURAL BASIS FOR INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION. 

The natural basis for this kind of education is found in 
tlie econonuc condition of the people and in the industries 
which they must pursue. They must earn their living with 
the labor of their own hands. Their wealth must come 
from the soil and the products of their handicrafts. They 
are their own carpenters, their own blacksmiths, and to a 
large extent their own weavers. Their household furniture, 
farming implements, and wearing apparel are largely home- 
made. Their resources and industrial environment consti- 
tute a basis of weaith which if developed by industrial e,du- 
cation will n-,ake them less dependent than any other people 
unon the outside world, for their living. 



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2: 



PART II. 



STORY OF THE EFFORT TO ESTABLISH THE 
PROJECTED INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL. 



In August, 1902, while on a visit to the county during 
my vacation as a teacher at Baylor L^niversity, Texas, I saw 
the great need of not only a strong school in the county, but 
of a school that would provide something more than the old 
education of the text-books. I noticed that the brightest boys 
were leaving the county, and that the girls, as a rule, were 
being left without education and in the midst of surroundings 
in which their social condition was helpless and hopeless. I 
thought how much it would mean if there could be a school in 
which these boys and girls could be educated at home and 
trained in profitable occupations so that they would remain in 
the county and marry and make homes and elevate the 
standards of life and society in their communities. 

With this thought in mind, I urged the building of such 
a school and agreed to undertake to secure outside aid for 
it if the people would take up the movement and carry it 
forward among themselves. This effort failed, however, on 
account of the divisions among the people and the lack of 
leadership. 

In June, 1903, my health at the same time requiring a 
change of work and climate, I resigned my position at Bay- 
lor Lhiiversity and returned to the county with the purpose 
of giving my personal attention to the work until a school 
should be established. 



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Tin-: Xew School Building. 



CANVASS FOR SUBSCRIPTIONS. 



I had saved a few hundred dollars out of my three years' 
teaching, and with a part of this I purchased a pony and a 
typewriter, and with the assistance of my wife as my secretary 
I began a canvass for subscriptions among the mountain 
farmers and a correspondence with people outside the county 
whom I thought I might interest in the undertaking. 

It w^as decided to locate the school in my home com- 
munity, which was the strongest in resources and population 
in the county and which offered a large tract of land and 
liberal subscriptions toward the construction. In the course 
of the summer and fall I found about 25 men in this com- 
munity who would give $100 each to have the school built 
in their midst. 

I then entered upon a canvass of the county to 6 'id how 
many citizens would give $100 to have the school built in the 
county. A few were found outside of the local community 
who would give this amount. I then sought for men in the 
local community and elsewhere who would give $50. then for 



23 

those who would give $25, and on down to a dollar. I \\as 
anxious to get every grown person in the con:ninnitv to cive 
something, and to get every voter in the county to contribute 
if possible. 

The subscriptions were taken on a two years plan 
to give the people time to meet the payments, and to develop 
tiie plans of the work and construct a suitable building. 

It was no slight task to make this thorough canvass of a 
county which is forty miles from corner to corner and in 
which the best mode of travel is on horseback. The work of 
securing and collecting the subscriptions has been so great 
that I have been able to carry it forward only from month to 
month as I found time from the attention required to the 
construction of the building and the correspondence and 
travel in the interest of the undertaking outside of the county. 



CONSTRUCTION OF THE BUILDING. 

As soon as enough subscriptions were secured to warrant 
the undertaking of the building, I organized a Board of 
Trustees of the best citizens of the county to hold the title to 
the property, and then organized a Building and Finance 
Committee of the best men in the local community. The 
men composing these two bodies, numbering about 20 active 
workers in all, have shown the stuff they are made of in the 
struggles through wdiich the undertaking has passed. 

The building, a modern structure especially designed for 
an industrial school, was begun with very little money in 
hand. It was not the simple matter of making an appro- 
priation and coming within its limits, but of projecting the 
imdertaking within its reasonable proportions and getting 
the people to pay in their money as they could, and when they 
had no money to give their labor and such building material 
as could be used. 

Some of them brought their teams and made the excava- 
tions for the basement story, others quarried and hauled the 
stone, still others cut and hauled the logs to the saw mill for 
the framing, and almost the entire community shared in hau4^^_ 
''ng the rest of the material over the mountains from the rail- 



25 



road, a distance of 15 or 20 miles for the round trip, and in 
this way saved a great deal of n:oney which they were unable 
to give. Thus the building was constructed as the money 
and material came in, and with the great gain that as it grew 
the .people felt that it was their own, and that as friendly 
gifts came from the outside they realized they were doing 
what they could to help themselves. 



THE PART OF THE ^lOUNTAIN PEOPLE IN THE 

WORK. 

About $5,000 has been raised in the county. Of this the 
local community has given abot $1,000, and the rest of the 
county about $1,000. The subscriptidiis have ranged from 
$125 to 25 cents. Nearly every grown person in the com- 
munity has given something, and more than a third of the 
voters of the county have contributed. 

The Rabun Gap School Improvement Club, an 
organization among the women and girls, has proved a most 
valuable auxiliary to the work of the men. Its work of 
beautifying the school grounds won for it, for amount of 
work done, first ■ mention in a contest among the school 
improvement clubs of the State. 



A W^ORK OF FAITH. 

The work of constructing the building and operating 
the school for its first term has now, (Alay 190(i), occupied 
almost three years. During this long period I have gone 
into every part of the county and have talked to almost every 
voter, either publicly or privately, on the subject of education.. 
Most of the time I have gone on horseback, sometimes in a- 
buggy, and often on foot. I have put my hands to every part: 
of the work, from hauling the stone from the quarry and the- 
logs to the saw mill. 

I have gone by faith and not by siglit. There have been^ 
many hours of discouragement and deep anguish of soul,, 
but despair has never been quite despair. I have been 



26 

guided at all times by an adibing faith and hope, and a con- 
sciousness of the great interests of the mountain people 
involved in the success or failure of the undertaking. 

Throughout the work I have had the assistance of my 
wife, herself a native of the mountains, who has been my 
secretary, has assisted in the work among the women 
and girls, and has taught the classes in sewing and needle 
work. I have also been constantly assisted by Mr. David 
Rickman, one of the mountain nien, who has been my local 
manager, has been faithful in all things, and has given freely 
of his means and practically a year of his time and labor. 
The undertaking would have been impossible, however, but 
for the great help of my aged father and mother who have 
divided their living with the school and have so kindly 
taken care of our little family while we have given ourselves 
and our all to the work. 



PART III. 



SKETCH OF THE INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL. 



LOCATION. 



The school is located in the large and beautiful valley at 
the source of the waters forming the Little Tennessee River, 
near the Rabun Gap, and near the watershed of the Blue 
Ridge between the Gulf and the Atlantic. It is on the line 
of the Tallulah Falls Railway, now being extended into the 
heart of this mountain region. 

The valley is about twenty-five niiles around the rim, 
and is regarded as the most beautiful in this part of the 
Appalachians. It contains about 400 school children attend- 
ing the new school and neighboring public schools. The 
school is so centrally located that the two largest public 
schools have been consolidated in the new building, and all 
of the 400 children live within four miles of its site. 
It is hoped that with the aid of funds to provide school 
transportation all of these 400 children can be brought to 



27 




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this central school. There is no school of advanced grade 
in all the surrounding country within a radius of 30 to 40 

miles. 

GENERAL PLAN AND SCOPE. 

The school is planned as an industrial and high school 
for the surrounding mountain country in which poor boys 
and girls can support themselves in part by their work, and 
as a model school for the local community. It is being 
operated in connection with the public school system and will 
be incorporated under the laws of Georgia with a board of 
directors of leading men and women in business and educa- 
tional circles. 

BUILDINGS AND GROUNDS. 

The property at present consists of a main building 
erected at a cost of about $7,500, and ten acres of land in 




AIr. ArRENDALE AND THE FiRST GrADE AT THE 

School Garden. 



the campus. The value of the entire equipment is now 
about $10,000. The building contains a complete basement 



29 

story for the departments of manual and domestic training, 
and two upper stories in which are six recitation rooms, 
the assembly room, and library. 

A contract has been closed on an adjacent tract of land 
of 30 acres for a school farm and school gardens. The 
building is seated on the crest of a beautiful knoll rising 
above the valley at its center, and this tract of 30 acres 
forms a plateau at the base of this elevation which afifords 
an ideal seat for the dormitories, cottages and gardens of 
the school settlement. 

Funds are being gathered by the Daughters of the Con- 
federacy of Georgia to build a large dormitory as a home 
for mountain girls who will do their own housekeeping and 
receive practical training in domestic science luider the 
supervision of the teachers in charge. 

A dormitory of a similar kind is being planned for boys 
who will earn a part of their expenses by their work and 
also do their own housekeeping. 

Alany pupils, both boys and girls, have been turned away 
from the school this year on account of the lack of room. 

PRESENT STATUS. 

Only a beginning has been made toward the kind of 
school which has been planned. A group of six teachers 
have been found who possess the training and consecration 
required, and a day school was opened last October on an 
industrial basis. About 340 pupils have been enrolled. 
These include seven grades of children and an additional 
grade of older students, a number of whom are preparing 
themselves to teach in the public schools of the county. 

The usual con.mon school and high school studies are 
taught in connection with training in manual, domestic and 
agricultural industries. Each pupil works an houv and a 
half each day. 

Thus far departments have been organized in Agriculture 
and School Gardening ; Carpentry and Blacksmithing ; Do- 
mestic Science and Home Administration; Sewing, Needle- 
work, and Basketry; r^Iountain Settlement and Mission 
Work ; and School Music. 



30 




o 

2 
o 
o 









31 

There is also a Library and Literary Circle, a Students' 
Prayer Meeting, a Temperance Union, and a Woman's Club 
which meet at the school. 

EXPENSES. 

The expenses are defrayed in small part by the public 
school fund apportioned to the community and such tuition 
fees and other contributions as the people are able to pa\. 
These funds, however, are so inadequate that the j^reater 
part of the funds required are raised by solicitation of 
individual contributions. 

IMMEDIATE NEEDS. 

1. To fmish paying for school farm $ 800 

2. To complete amount needed for girls' dormitory-- l.'^OO 

3. To cover difference between local funds and 

operating expenses for the coming year 2,000 

4. To provide industrial equipment 1,000 

5. To build a boys' dormitory '2, 500 

C. To build a teachers' home 2.000 

7. To purchase a school piano 300 

6. To provide a horse and buggy for settlement and 

mission work 200 

SCHOLARSHIPS. 

a. $10 will pay for tuition for the poorest child in the 
community for a session of eight (S) n^onths, at $2 per 
month. 

b. $.")*» will cover board and tuition and enable a moun- 
tain boy or girl to live at the chool eight (8) months, with 
what thcv can earn bv their work. 



32 




o 



o 

pa 



PART IV. 

SCHOOL EXTENSION WORK. 
In lanuarv, 1905, I became County Superintendent of 
Schools. I found that there were in the county about 2,000 
school children and about 3.5 public schools. Less than three- 
fourths of the children were being enrolled in the schools, 
and less than half were in regular attendance. The school 
term was only 90 days in the year, and several schools were 
in operation only HO or TO days on account of the uncomfor- 
table condition of the houses during cold weather. 

SCHOOL HOUSES. 

The average school house is a log cabin or weather- 
boarded shanty without ceiling, comfortable heating, seating, 
c- other modern equipment. Until the opening of the Indus- 
trial School, 1905, there was not a modern school desk in 
the county. Schools are taught in a number of houses 
which are not worth $20. The entire school equipment in 
]903 was officially reported at $4,000, or about $2 worth 
of school property for each pupil, which was a high val- 
uation.. 

SCHOOL CONSOLIDATION. 

The county is made up of several small communities in 
which only one school is possible and of other larger ones 
in which the number of schools has been multiplied beyond 
I lie number needed. 

These larger communities are the large valleys and places 
v/here several valleys come together and form a natural 
school center accessible to a large population. The roads 
come down the creeks to their junction with the larger creek 
or river, and at the junction of the roads is the country store, 
the postoffice, the "law ground," and the church, but, cur- 
iously enough, not always the school. 

The reason is that the mountaineer wants the school as 
near as possible to his door and- on his side of the creek. It 



34 




o 

xi 
m 



35 

matters not whether there are enough pupils to make a school 
which will pay a teacher or whether the teacher is compe- 
tent to teach. There has been consolidation and central- 
ization in everything else, but the community of interests in 
the school have been parceled out among the creeks, wdth 
the result of the log schoolhouse, the indifferent teacher, and 
the poorly attended school. 

The im.portance of school consolidation in the little moun- 
tain community in which it takes all the people to build a 
good schoolhouse and all the children to make a good school, 
and in which the people need to be brought together in 
harmonious community action, can readily be seen. The fol- 
lowing are a few instances in which consolidation has been 
accomplished. 

CONSOLIDATION AT RABUN GAP. 

At the beginning of the work to estabUsh the Industrial 
School at Rabun Gap there were in the community six public 
schools attended by about 400 children. The two largest 
oi these schools have been consolidated in the new school. 
The larger of the old buildings will be used temporarily as 
a dormitory for boys. This consolidation was made possible 
through the outside aid secured in building this large school, 
secured in building this large school. 

THE OLD AND NEW AT WOLE EORK. 

The Wolf Fork community lies at the junction of several 
creeks which come together from opposite directions. Here 
two schools have been brought together in a new school 
which will have about SO pupils and two teachers, making 
possible a graded school. One of the old buildings and the 
new one appear in the cuts, showing the contrast. One of the 
old houses has been sold for $17, and will be removed and 
made into a barn. The new building cost $500. Another 
$100 has been added to purchase modern desks, and still 
another $100 to extend the public school term. A few years 
ago this community w-as a famous whiskey center. The 
consumm.ation here presented has been brought about by 
a little outside aid and initiative, and the exam.ple of the 
people at Rabun Gap. 



36 




The Old at Wolf Fork— Sold for $17. 




The New at Wolf Fork. Value of Building 
and Equipments, 



THE SITUATION AT TIGER. 

At Tiger, in the southern part of the county, the situation 
was, until the beginning of this work, in a state of chaos. 
There were two Httle schools, almost in sight of each other, 
being taught in wretched houses ; the two school constitu- 
encies were jealous of each other, and one of them was 



37 

liopelessly diviiied within itself. After a series of school 
meetings and conferences, and with the ofifer of a little aid 
out of a building fund which I have managed to get together, 
tlie two parts of the community have come together and 
adopted a location for a consolidated school, have let the 
contract for the building, and have raised a subscription of 
SCOO among themselves. The new school will bring together 
abiiut 1 10 pu])ils and will require three teachers. 

THE REST OF TTIl- COUNTY. 

The work thus begun shows the way in which the public 
school s\stem of tlie county is to be reconstructed and in 
which these struggling little schools are to be built up. There 
are about twenty other places in the county in which new 
schoolhouses are badly needed and at perhaps half of these 
two schools should be consolidated in one. In most of the 
cases, however, the peo^ple are too poor to do as much as 
at the stronger places where the work has been started. In 
several places the}- are unable to contribute any money at all. 
They have, however, pk^nty of timber for building, and are 
willing to give this and cut it and haul it to the saw mill and 
help construct the house, if enough money can be secured 
to get such material as can be paid for only in cash. 




A Typical Log Structi;re at Bridge Creek— Value aboiat i20. 



38 

NI^EDS. 

The needs of the school extension work are, first, a fund 
from outside sources to he used in consoHdating schools and 
building new houses, to be given on condition that the 
people do what they can. From $:><>0 to $7.-)0 will build a 
school house that will last for a generation, ^^'ith the start 
that has been made, if I could have at my disposal as County 
Superintendent $1,000 a year for three years, I could in that 
time secure the building of a new set of school houses 
ihroiughout the county. 

Second, a similar fund to be used in supplementing the 
local funds to extend the ])ul)lic school term. An outside 
fund of |i,ooo a year for three years would secure 
the extension of the school term lo six months. 




Good Honest Mountain Folk of the Isolated Settlement. 



ENDORSEMENTS OF THE WORK. 



J. M. TERRELL, Governor of Georgia. 

' ' T have liad occasion to visit, tlie Rabiui Tmlustrial 8ehool, at 
T.'alnni Gap, Ga., and 1 take plea.snre in nnrt servcdly commending tlrat 
school and its fonndtr. Prof. A. J. Ritchie, to all good people inter- 
e.sted in educational matters. This sciiool reaches th" mountain boys 
and girls of Northeast Georgia and Western Nortli Carolina and 
affords them an opportunity to secure an education and special train- 
ing along those lines most needed by them. 

W. B. MERRITT, State School Commissioner. 

"Prof, Ritchie has undertaken to establisli an indiistri.-d school 
for the boys and girls of the Blue Ridge mountains, v.iiich is the 
most illiterate section oi' our State. Sucli a scliool is greatlv needed, 
and Mr. Ritchie's jilans are apjn-oved bv our educjitors, ami Ity 
thoughtful men all over the State. Since nmlertaking this work Mr. 
Ritchie has become Sni)erintendent of Sciiools in tlie county in which 
the work is located, and he ami his wife are living on the meagre 
salary which tiiis position aflords and devoting tliemselves to this 
nohh^ work. Any aid tiiat nuiv be gi\en him in this important and 
<lillicnlt work will lie worthi'y liestnwcd." 

The late Chancellor W. B. HILL, of the University of Georgia. 

"Prof. Ritchie is a nati\e of Rabun County who obtained a 
college education in Georgia and took a. course at Harvard and had 
a position as teacher in Baylor University. He gave up this position 
and pi'os})ect of ad\'aiu-ement to return and h<d]> the peojile of his 
Jiati\e county. I do not know of any instance of sacrifice and 
service equal to that Mr. Ritchie is rendering to his people, 
and I do not believe there can be lomid anywhere in 
the United States a local etl'ort under Imi'd and unpromising con- 
ditions which would sur))a8S what tin' rui'al monntain projile of Ralnin 
County have ilone for tliis sch(i(d. ' ' 

E. C. BRANSON, President State Normal School. 

"I know tlie county, the community, and the conditions con- 
cerned in the enterjirise wliicii Mr. Ritchie represents. The kind of 
sciiool proposed for the people of this remote mountain region would 
thoroughly illustrate the value of a rural indu-itrinl school of advanced 
grade. It is a unique situation and offers a unitpie opportunity for 
the benevolence of the generous and the well-to-do. 1 heartily commend 
the enterprise. ' ' 

HOKE SMITH, Ex-Secretary of the Interior. 

"Prof. Ritchie, realizing the needs of improxcd metho<ls and 
advancement in tlie schools for white boys and girls among the moun- 
tain districts of Nortli Georgia, abandoned college teaching ;uid has 
established an industrial school in Rabun County to meet the needs 
of these people, and is now endeavoring to nuiintain this institution 
by raising funds by private subscriptions, I know Mr, Ritchie person- 



40 

ally, am familiar with his plans, have visited the school in the course 
of its construction, and am glad to give him and his undertaking my 
cordial endorsement and personal assistance. ' ' 

REV. S. Y. JAMESON, D. D., Secretary of the Baptist Mission 
Board of Georgia. 

"Having been acquainted with Kabun County and contiguous 
territory for a number of years, T do not hesitate to endorse the move- 
ment to establish an industrial and literary school in that section in 
which such a school is so greatly needed. The demand of the school 
is imperative, and money expended in its support will yield a large 
dividend iu the upbuilding of the race. Prof. Eitchie 's self-sacrificing 
labor in behalf of the people of his native county is another evidence 
that the age of genuine heroism has not entirely given place to the 
reign of materialism and selfishness. ' ' 

EMORY SPEER, United States Judge. 
"It would be diflicult to find a section of the country where the 
kind of school proposed would accomplish greater good to "a greater 
number. The writer is well acquainted with the character of the 
people of Eabun County. No section of the United States produces 
people of more robust native intellectuality, and all tliat is needed 
is to afford these strong and vigorous minds the education and 
training which such a school will give them. ' ' 

JOHN J. KIMSEY, Judge of the Superior Court, Northeastern 

Circuit of Georgia. 

' ' I heartily endorse what is said of Mr. Eitchie and believe that 

the undertaking which he has in hand will lay the foundation for a 

great work of education in that section, where it will do great good. ' ' 

W. J. NORTHERN, Ex-Governor of Georgia. 
"The work undertaken by Prof. Ritchie is in my judgment, 
one of the greatest educational needs of the State." 




A Pioneer Residence. 




H. V. M. MILLER, M. D., LL.D. 

General Andrew Miller was an American officer in the war of 
1812, from South Carolina. His wife was a Miss Cheri, of Virginia, 
of Huguenot descent. The family moved to Georgia and settled in 
the Little Tennesseee Valley, near Rabun Gap. The Miller residence 
was one of the first frame houses built in this section. It still stands 
about a mile south of the Industrial School. It was here that Dr. Mil- 
ler spent his boyhood, among the inspiring scenes of Georgia's grand- 
est mountains. Later the family left this section, and the son became 
known in Georgia politics as the " Demosthenes of the Mountains," 
was elected U. S. Senator in the days of Reconstruction, and died 
dean of the Georgia medical profession. His brilliant career shows 
the stuff that is in the mountain boy and his attainments when he 
gets a chance. 



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